User Reviews

At first, I though this could be an excellent drama, knowing Tennant to be an excellent actor. And he is an excellent one, I assure you, and that's maybe the best part of it. But the melodramatic tone of the story, coupled with the omnipresence of the musical score, soon became an annoying tv experience. Recommended only for tennant's fans. Period.

As a murder mystery, Broadchurch is satisfyingly complex (even if the accents may take some getting used to). As an exploration of grief it is even better, with Ms. Whittaker and Ms. Colman pointing the way. But in its long, slow unfolding Broadchurch is most magnificent in another sense--as an elegy for the happy innocence of ignorance.

Broadchurch doesn't come with many stylistic flourishes--it's a pretty straightforward crime story. But the care given to its characters and the damage the crime inflicts on the town make it one of the best scripted series of the summer.

Broadchurch excels at showing the awkward moments between the briskly delivered plot points, and the small details of voice and gesture that define communities in mourning (or guilty panic), and it has the good sense not to overdo anything.... And yet there's something fundamentally unsatisfying about the whole thing, as smart and intricately structured as it is--and it has nothing whatsoever to do with any writing or acting or filmmaking issues, and everything to do with the fact that we've just been to this particular narrative well too many times in 2013.